Scales

The reason I still play an instrument today, 30 years later, is because I learned the scales.

Knowing the scales allows your fingers to more easily pickup melodies from songs, since all melodies are based on scales.

Inversions & Pentatonic Scale Cages

Note: Although I'll dive into the movable chords further in another tutorial, I want to point out the 3 moveable chord shapes in the first half of this video (diamonds are the root note):

Root notes stay the same and help you know where to start the cages:

Here are the major scale cages (all 7 notes), which I cover in Uke 202:

Movable Chords Within the Scales

Using Scales to Build Chords

Chords also use scales. The major chord (also called a triad) contain notes 1,3,5 (I, III, V) from the scale. Minor chords are the 1, 3b, 5 (I, IIIb, V) notes from the scale (notice how the 3 is a flat?). A flat is one half step (or fret) down.

If you know the chord formula and you know the scale, you can construct any chord.

Good luck and have fun!

~ Brian

More Resources

• Another Approach (Do Re Mi)